Cisco Webex, formerly WebEx Communications Inc., is a company that provides on-demand collaboration, online meeting, web conferencing and videoconferencing applications. As a SAML2 service provider, Cisco Webex can be integrated with CAS running as a SAML identity provider and this blog post provides a quick walkthrough of how to make that integration possible.

Our starting position is based on the following:

• CAS 5.3.x
• Java 8
• Maven Overlay (The 5.3 branch specifically)

Cisco Webex Configuration

Download the service provider metadata and upload the CAS identity provider metadata. No other configuration is required.

CAS Configuration

First, ensure that your CAS deployment is equipped to act as a SAML2 identity provider. Next, you may also use the JSON Service Registry to keep track of the Cisco Webex relying-party registration record in JSON definition files.

The JSON file to contain the Cisco Webex record would be as follows:

{
  @class: org.apereo.cas.support.saml.services.SamlRegisteredService
  serviceId: ^https://idbroker.webex.com/.*
  name: Cisco Webex
  id: 1
  description: Cisco Webex
  usernameAttributeProvider:
  {
    @class: org.apereo.cas.services.PrincipalAttributeRegisteredServiceUsernameProvider
    usernameAttribute: mail
  }
  attributeReleasePolicy:
  {
    @class: org.apereo.cas.services.ReturnMappedAttributeReleasePolicy
    allowedAttributes:
    [
      @class: java.util.TreeMap
      givenName: [ java.util.ArrayList [ firstName ] ]
      mail: [ java.util.ArrayList [ email ] ]
      sn: [ java.util.ArrayList [ lastName ] ]
      displayName: [ java.util.ArrayList [ displayName ] ]
    ]
  }
  metadataLocation: /path/to/webex-metadata.xml
  signAssertions: true
  skipGeneratingSubjectConfirmationNotBefore: true
  requiredNameIdFormat: urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:1.1:nameid-format:emailAddress
  signResponses: true
}

A few things to point out:

• You will need to adjust the serviceId and metadataLocation to match your data and the Cisco Webex instance.
• Make sure CAS has retrieved the allowed attributes (i.e. mail, givenName, etc) listed in the JSON definition file.

Finale

Thanks to Keith Conger of Colorado College who was kind enough to share the above integration notes. If you too have an integration with a well-known SAML2 service provider, please consider sharing that guide in form of a blog post here as well.

Misagh Moayyed